what’s strange, what would be marvelous, is not that God should really exist; the marvel is that such an idea, the idea of the necessity of God, could enter the head of such a savage,...

For though your mind is active enough, your heart is darkened with corruption, and without a pure heart there can be no full or genuine sensibility.

Can you blame me, my dear, for looking on this attachment as a romantic folly inspired by that cursed Shakespeare who will poke his nose where he is not wanted?

E po, mirupafshim! Po me mbyt trishtimi, nga merzia. Seç kam nje brenge ne shpirt, Makar Aleksejeviç. As vete s’e di arsyen. E tille dite paska qene. Mirupafshim!

As soon as he reflected seriously he was convinced of the existence of God and immortality, and at once he instinctively said to himself: “I want to live for immortality, and I will accept no...

… the more I learned, the more conscious did I become of the fact that I was ridiculous. So that for me my years of hard work at the university seem in the end to...

let me be!

Lying to ourselves is more deeply ingrained than lying to others.

The perpetration of a crime is accompanied by illness!

Some sleepers have intelligent faces even in sleep, while other faces, even intelligent ones, become very stupid in sleep and therefore ridiculous. I don’t know what makes that happen; I only want to say that...

Ah, Misha, he has a stormy spirit. His mind is in bondage. He is haunted by a great, unsolved doubt. He is one of those who don’t want millions, but an answer to their questions.

O principal é não mentir. Quem mente para si mesmo e dá ouvido à sua própria mentira chega a tal extremo que não consegue ver nenhuma verdade em si ou naqueles que o rodeiam e,...

What if man is not really a scoundrel, man in general, I mean, the whole race of mankind-then all the rest is prejudice, simply artificial terrors and there are no barriers and it’s all as...

It appeared to him strange and marvelous that he should have stopped in the very same place as he used to do, as if he really imagined he could think the same thoughts now as...

Don’t be surprised that I value prejudice, observe certain conventions, seek power–it’s because I know I live in an empty society.

My wretched passions were acute, smarting, from my continual, sickly irritability I had hysterical impulses, with tears and convulsions. I had no resource except reading, that is, there was nothing in my surroundings which I...

Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart.

But men love abstract reasoning and neat systematization so much that they think nothing of distorting the truth, closing their eyes and ears to contrary evidence to preserve their logical constructions.

There is only one way to salvation, and that is to make yourself responsible for all men’s sins. As soon as you make yourself responsible in all sincerity for everything and for everyone, you will...

I don’t need you to tell me I’m not well, though I don’t really know what’s wrong with me; I think I’m five times healthier than you are.

Or perhaps it is because it is so NECESSARY for you to win. It is like a drowning man catching at a straw. You yourself will agree that, unless he were drowning he would not...

If I had a reader and he had read all I have written so far of my adventures, there would be certainly no need to inform him that I am not created for any sort...

The world says: “You have needs — satisfy them. You have as much right as the rich and the mighty. Don’t hesitate to satisfy your needs; indeed, expand your needs and demand more.” This is...

Above all, don’t lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so...

Where is it I’ve read that someone condemned to death says or thinks, an hour before his death, that if he had to live on some high rock, on such a narrow ledge that he’d...

There are some people about whom it is difficult to say anything which would describe them immediately and fully in their most typical and characteristic aspects; these are the people who are usually called “ordinary”...

how anxiously I yearned for those I had forsaken.

the greater the power, the more terrible its responsibility.

A long while yet will you keep that great mother’s grief. But it will turn in the end into quiet joy, and your bitter tears will be only tears of tender sorrow that purifies the...

Oh, with my pathetic, earthly, Euclidean mind, I know only that there is suffering, that none are to blame, that all things follow simply and directly from one another, that everything flows and finds its...

Brother, I’m not depressed and haven’t lost spirit. Life everywhere is life, life is in ourselves and not in the external. There will be people near me, and to be a human being among human...

A percentage! What splendid words they have; they are so scientific, so consolatory…. Once you’ve said ‘percentage’ there’s nothing more to worry about. If we had any other word… maybe we might feel more uneasy….

Nothing helps a man to reform like thinking of the past with regret.

Right or wrong, it’s very pleasant to break something from time to time.

I always feel when I meet people that I am lower than all, and that they all take me for a buffoon; so I say let me play the buffoon, for you are, every one...

And no one, no one should know what passes between husband and wife if they love one another. And whatever quarrels there may be between them they ought not to call in their own mother...

Because it begins to seem to me at such times that I am incapable of beginning a life in real life, because it has seemed to me that I have lost all touch, all instinct...

Even there, in the mines, underground, I may find a human heart in another convict and murderer by my side, and I may make friends with him, for even there one may live and love...

Beauty is a terrible and awful thing! It is terrible because it has not been fathomed and never can be fathomed, for God sets us nothing but riddles. Here the boundaries meet and all contradictions...

I am told that the proximity of punishment arouses real repentance in the criminal and sometimes awakens a feeling of genuine remorse in the most hardened heart; I am told this is due to fear.

I worked it through with pride,I almost spoke without words, and i’m masterly at speaking without words.All my life I have spoken without words, and I have passed through whole tragedies on my own account...

Lere pastaj qe ka dhe jo pak pasunare qe s’i pelqen te degjojne ankimet me ze te larte te varfanjakeve. Se, sigurisht, i shqetesojne, i bezdisin me ankesat pa fund. Po, moj shpirt, varferia kurdohere...

But I’ve still better things about children. I’ve collected a great, great deal about Russian children, Alyosha. There was a little girl of five who was hated by her father and mother, ‘most worthy and...

Doesn’t there, in fact, exist something that is dearer to almost every man than his own very best interests, or – not to violate logic – some best good … which is more important and...

But how did I murder her? Is that how men do murders? Do men go to commit a murder as I went then? I will tell you some day how I went! Did I murder...

You will have many enemies, but even your foes will love you. Life will bring you many misfortunes, but you will find your happiness in them, and will bless life and will make others bless...

He could not consent to allow himself to be insulted, still less to allow himself to be treated as a rag, and, above all, to allow a thoroughly vicious man to treat him so. No...

In Russia, drunks are our kindest people. Our kindest people are also the most drunk.

No, it is not a commonplace, sir! If up to now, for example, I have been told to ‘love my neighbor,’ and I did love him, what came of it?. . . What came of...

Escute mais isso. Por outro lado, forças jovens, frescas, sucumbem em vão por falta de apoio, e isso aos milhares, e isso em toda parte! Cem, mil boas ações e iniciativas que poderiam ser implementadas...